1986 Mazda RX-7 Sport
 

Hello everybody I've been on this forum for a month or so now and figured it's time to post up my build page. In the past I've always built Honda's and to make a Honda a respectable "sport" car you have to dump a lot of money, time, and bloody knuckles into them. When it was time for me to get away from Honda and into a real car, I originally wanted to find another AE86. Hands down the best car I've ever owned and I greatly regret trading it for a Honda Civic a few years back... But being I'm in the MidWest a clean rust free AE86 is damn near impossible, and I had all but given up on the search for another one when I came across this RX-7.

A friend of mine had traded his project 1986.5 Toyota Supra for a rolling shell 1986 Mazda RX-7 Sport thinking he'd eventually stuff another 13b under the hood and have fun with it. But I made him a cash offer he could not refuse and it's been siting in my garage since the first of December 2014.

A little about the car before I get to the pictures, being a MidWest car its whole life and being rust free is insane. I've never seen a car this old not have rust, and the interior was mostly there which was a big bonus considering it's got the red interior which I'm finding is hard to find parts for. Overall I would of given the car a 7/10 but it still needed a few things done, but that's the fun part right?!

Listen we all know what an FC RX-7 is and what they have so I don't really need to explain anymore about the car itself that wont be explained in the pictures. But with any car I plan to do anything with I have to make a build list, check it twice, and change it about 100 times before I'm happy. Well that was what I typically did with a Honda build, and the list was LONG... But to my most pleasant after doing my research on the FC and looking up other builds. I knew what I needed to do to the car to make it into what I wanted to do with it. Which is really just a good weather joy ride on the twisty back roads of the Ozarks!

Turns out as you all know the FC is such a well rounded true sports car not a lot has to be done in order to achieve the desired results. Really I could of just replaced old worn parts with new OEM parts and probably been pretty happy. But what's the fun in that? So here is my list of thing that will be performed to my 86 RX-7 Sport.

NA 13b Rotary
NA 5 Speed Transmission
86-88 NA LSD Rear Diff
Prothane Master Bushing Kit
Megan Racing EZ Street Coilovers
Ultra Racing Front and Rear Strut Tower Bars
Katana Speed-Line 16x7 +40 wheels
BFGoodrich G-Force Sport COMP-2 225/50R16
NRG Short Hub
NRG Quick Release
NARDI Steering Wheel
Mazdatrix Short Shifter Kit
K&N Cone Filter and MAF Adapter
Racing Beats Header
2.5" SS Mandrel Bent Exhaust with Dual MagnaFlow Mufflers
Street Rays Solid Motor/Trans Mounts
Devin Diff Mounts
BRIDE Racing Seats with Adjustable Rails

That just about sums up the list, and a lot of those parts have been bought and installed at this point. Some things still needing to be found and bought, but we all have a budget... Well... At least I do anyways... So now that you've all passed over everything I've typed and skipped straight to the pictures. I better get to posting pictures before you all think all I'm doing is typing information down that none of you really car to read. Because I'm sure there are hundreds if not thousands of build threads that are similar if not identical to mine...

The fist picture and the first night it stayed in my garage:
Attachment 630315

After cleaning up the interior a bit, really all I did was vacuum the carpet:

Attachment 630316
Attachment 630317

After a good cleaning the next thing on the list was a power plant. Originally I wanted to swap a 2JZ-GE under the bonnet. But after looking at four different engines and they were all high mileage paper weights with a stupid price tag. I decided to hit up The Rotary Doctor in Neosho, MO and he hooked me up with this low miles great compression 13b:
Attachment 630318

Compression Numbers:
Attachment 630319

As well as this rebuilt and ready to go 5 speed transmission with shitty ebay short shifter:
Attachment 630320

Mated everything together:
Attachment 630321

StreetRays Solid Motor/Trans Mounts:
Attachment 630322

Prothane Master Bushing Kit:
Attachment 630323

Katana Speed-Line 16x7 +40 Wheels:
Attachment 630324

Wrapped in BFGoodrich G-Force Sport COMP-2:
Attachment 630325

Attachment 630304

On jack stands getting ready for some love:
Attachment 630305

Megan Racing EZ Street 15-way Adjustable Fullbody Coilovers:
Attachment 630306

Prothane Kit, Coilovers, Wheels and Tires all installed:
Attachment 630307
Attachment 630308


Pushed out of the garage for the first time in a few months to have the engine bay cleaned and prepped for paint:
Attachment 630309

Used Racing Beats Header Getting Prepped for Paint:
Attachment 630310

After:
Attachment 630311

Showing off the Magnaflow Exhaust:
Attachment 630312

Engine Bay Painted and ready for a new hear:
Attachment 630313

Just a neat picture I took while removing all the emissions from the 13b:
Attachment 630314

1986-88 NA LSD:
Attachment 630303

Anyways... This is now all caught up pretty much, I had the new rear diff gear lash checked since it was a rebuilt unit and it was spot on. The engine bay is still empty waiting for the engine to be implanted. But with this horrible MidWest weather I don't see it happening anytime soon. I hate the cold and I hate snow, we currently have both... I seriously cannot wait to look back on this thread in a few months when it's 75F and I'm cruising the back roads. And say to myself, "Wow! It sucked when I typed all of this."

So yeah... I guess as things happen and more parts come in I'll update this thread. So until then STAY TUNED! ~ See what I did there ;)

BTW THIS 12 PICTURES PER POST IS DUMB, just sayin...

Hey brother looks really good, can't wait to see it up and running! I'm in the same boat out in Overland Park, ripped everything apart right before it got cold and just waiting to put it back together once it's nice.

Where is Rogersville at? We have a few guys in the Shawnee/OP/KC area. Just curious how far you are from us.

Rogersville is about 15 miles East on HWY 60 from Springfield, MO. So I'm a few hours from you all. I'm actually originally from Independence but been living down here for a while now. I'm pretty sure I have the only FC in this area I live in.

I love it when toys come in the mail! Hope the Nardi wheel will be here before the end of this week...

Attachment 630257

Nice setup! What quick release did you go with?

I'm cheap so I got v1.0 lol it will do the job just fine :)

I decided to bear the 25F temp of my garage and install the hub and QR tonight. Took me like 10 min tops, this will also be the first time I've used an NRG hub and the horn will work from the get go!!

Attachment 630227

Nice! Should work great with the Nardi. I've got an NRG short hub in my S5 but don't have a quick release for it yet, let me know how you like it. My S4 has a Sparco hub and quick release and I'm really happy with it, not sure if I should copy it in both cars.

I can already tell you from experience the NRG short hub and NRG quick release is hands down the best combo on the market. I had the exact setup in both my AE86 and del Sol, very solid, no movement at all what so ever. It's the only setup I'll use in any of my cars when it comes to an aftermarket steering wheel. I have less than $200 in the whole setup.

I've never owned an NRG. But I picked up a fantastic condition Works bell rapfix II and lock for 250. Seem extremely solid except the bent lock key.

I do plan on using a short hub. With the short hub, how close is the hub to the column cover? And can you retail that turn cancel/horn mechanism?

Cheers for a great looking build!!!

The short hub does ride up pretty close to the column covers, I've even read some people had to trim the hole a little bit. I didn't have to for me it fits near perfect, and with the turn signal cancel there are provisions on the back of the hub to fit the tabs for that. It all fits perfect 0 issues, I'm very pleased with it all.

Stoked!

BAM! I ordered this from Tokyo this past Saturday and it arrived today. Gotta love those Japanese!! Also it is an older used wheel, for some reason when it comes to steering wheels I love period correct wheels to match the car. It's got a tiny bit of wear but not enough for me to turn it down for the price I paid for it. I'll have it installed this evening when I got off work.

Attachment 630209

What did you buy it off of? Rinkya?

I bought the wheel off of the Japanese ebay.

No hassles with shipping!!?? I've heard nightmares about yahoojpn

None so far, I've bought just a hand full of things. Shipping has been more than fair and very fast, I typically don't tell prices on stuff I buy. But I paid $88 shipped to my front door, and got it in four days.

F'in A I'll have to mess around with it later

Got the wheel installed, still waiting for my aftermarket Mazda Speed horn button to come in. But I'm very happy with how everything turned out so far, my only concern is the button I ordered has only one spade connector on the back of it. I'm assuming that is the yellow constant power wire with the hub and quick release. Not sure where the ground will go, I'm guessing anywhere I can ground it... I'll figure it out for sure...

First picture is just an overall shot of the whole interior view:
Attachment 630199

This picture is to show how much space the hub and QR assembly is taking up, not much more than the factory position:
Attachment 630200

This will probably be one of the last updates for a while as I don't really have anything else coming in. But stay tuned for more to come!

I have a steering column surround if you are interested, comes with the ring around the key hole and all. 35$ shipped to your door and you can make that look uber clean!

I will take you up on your offer, for I do have mine but it's broken on both ends.

Small but big update!

My Mazdatrix short shifter showed up today and I promptly went to install it. But ran across a pretty big issue right away... If you want to read up on it you can find the post in the 2nd gen thread... But long story short, I ordered the shift kit for the 84-88 trans only to find out I have an 81-83 trans. After some research and monkey business I was able to use some of the ebay shifter I had before to install the Mazdatrix shifter properly. Shifts like butter... Now I need to find a freaking shift knob, and a struggle it will be!!! 12x1.50 FTL.....

Attachment 630137

Stay tuned for more to come!!!

Hey guys and gals with the weather getting nice in Missouri, it means I have a few small updates for you all. The last few posts I've made have been long winded, I know this... So I'm going to do you all a favor and keep them short and to the point form here on out. Also if interested in the build and want updates faster you can follow my instagram "joshsanders85". Anyways, onto the updates!

This past Sunday the weather was nice enough to have friends over for a BBQ and rotary install. Overall went pretty smooth!
Attachment 629015

Also went ahead and ordered Ultra Racing front and rear strut tower bars, wasn't a fan of having to cut the rear speaker mounts. But I wasn't going to run a radio anyways.
Attachment 629016
Attachment 629017

And thanks to FCJG15 I have a MUCH cleaner interior now, still have a few things to find but it's getting there! New (to me) gauge cluster, cluster surround, shifter bezel, steering column covers all from him! Thanks again man!
Attachment 629018

Another angle of the newly updated interior with Mazdatrix short throw shifter:
Attachment 629019

And last for tonight I went ahead and bought an oil catch can setup to vent the top port on the oil fill tube. I didn't want the oil possibly venting to atmosphere... I fell like I found a pretty good place for it!
Attachment 629020

More to come as I start to button up the engine bay and get ready to fire the car up for the first time, so stay tuned!

What a nice steering column cover and steering wheel set up >:) looks great!

Tiny update, the engine bay is starting to look a lot more cluttered these days. A few more things I need to buy and finish up such as oil cooler needs re-installed, finish installing the engine harness, clutch slave cylinder and I'm sure other little things.

Attachment 628696

Man I'm horrible at keeping build threads updated... But honestly not a lot of cool things have happened since my last update. Minus getting the car running and driving... I do have a couple things I can post about with video and pictures so I guess I can do that for those of you who care.

This past weekend I was able to install my NA LSD rear diff with all new delrin mounts in the rear and a Mazdatrix hard rubber mount in the front of it. And that is all that is really worth mentioning, engine bay is cleaned up a bit but still more to do. In the following updates there should be interior updates and I'm going to try and make plans to corner balance the car and raise the suspension a bit. It's just a bit to low for me I'm not into "stance nation" and destroying the undercarriage of the car...

So yeah here are a few pics and a video I can show off, please don't mind the commentary in the video I hate my voice...

Removing the old diff and dropping the subframe:
Attachment 627259

Rear diff cover with the delrin mounts installed:
Attachment 627260

And a quick video of the car running as I do a walk around. Yes since then I've topped off the coolant, and yes it has an exhaust leak I need to fix as soon as I can.

http://vid88.photobucket.com/albums/...pstephq59x.mp4

Hope you all enjoyed, and stay tuned for more updates!

Oh wow, so I've neglected this big time! Been way too long since I've last updated, I guess a lot has happened since the last post I've made and I'll do my best to do the quick version.

So I got to drive the car for about a thousand miles and this happened:
Attachment 618314

Long story short, as soon as I started driving the car I noticed about every 50 miles or so my coolant buzzer came on and my overflow tank would be full. So doing some research and talking to a few local rotary guys, I was able to make the assumption I had a bad internal issue. So I parked the car and then decided to go into turbo mode building my 98 Honda Civic so I'd have a daily.

I then pulled the 13b, ripped it apart and found the water jacket destroyed. Got myself a new plate from the Rotary Doctor and that's about it. Also reverse in my trans has something wrong with it, you have to "find" reverse and when you do it will destroy the reverse light switch. And then to get out of reverse you have to hit the shifter out of gear. Not sure how this happened, but something is broken/bent... So that too will be ripped apart soon to diagnose and fix the issue.

And one last thing, I've decided to go a bit different with my 6-port.... First of all I'd be dumb to not do some kind of port job, and I decided with a street port. But the big decision some of you will scratch your head at. I'm ditching EFI and running a Weber 48 DCOE carb! Already ordered the Atkins wrap around intake manifold and DCOE kit. If tracking is correct, and the weather in the Mid-West does not slow it down. I should have the kit by this Tuesday, so more pics to come!

One last pic, the current state of my 6-port...
Attachment 618315

So I promised an update today with pictures, so here ya go! Got to my office this morning and a big box was sitting on my desk. And inside said box? This....

Attachment 618279

Hey bud it's been a long time. Hoping to see more build thread updates!

Also if you're getting rid of that hard intake piping shoot me a PM! Lol

this is a pretty sweet build so far. keep up the updates.

Oh I guess I won't have any use for it anymore haha, I need to put together a for sale thread of all the leftover stuff I'm going to have from the EFI setup. I'm sure some of it will eventually sell!

Thanks! I hope to have updates as frequently as possible.

Also small updates, last night I ordered mild intake/exhaust street port templates from Pineapple Racing, hope to have them in by the end of next week.

How do the wheels fit? Anymore pictures of how they fit?

Well don't have a ton of recent pictures of it with the wheels, but the wheels are the exact size and offset as TII wheels. So they fit perfect, the tires are a 225/50/16 I had to have coilovers to fit the tires in the front. But here are a few more pictures showing off the wheels.

Attachment 618190
Attachment 618191
Attachment 618192

Just a small update for anybody who cares, I went ahead and ordered my intake and exhaust porting templates from Pineapple Racing. Upon getting the templates, I realized that I ordered the wrong intake template. Instead of getting a 6-port template, I got a 4-port template but instead of returning it I decided to go ahead and keep it. Never know what I'll have in the future.... After looking around on PR's page I realized they didn't have a template for the 6-port so I ordered Mazdatrix 6-port template. I also decided to keep the PR exhaust template, I have no reason to believe that it won't work well with the MT intake template.

Also I started to do my research on how to get power to the 12a distributor I'll be using, and after asking a ton of questions and reading up on a few threads. I've come to the conclusion the best setup for me and my budget is to go DLIDFIS. I purchased 3 GM ICM, and 2 OEM replacement ignition coils, this setup should give me a stronger and hotter spark over the factory 12a distributor setup.

Mazdatrix 6-port Street Port vs Pineapple Racing 4-port "medium" street port:
Attachment 617284

Comparing the differences in the ports between the two templates:
Attachment 617285

Pineapple Racing exhaust template:
Attachment 617286

More to come very soon!

Ok, so... I by no means am a rich person, I'm actually pretty poor. So choosing to own and build a rotary powered car is probably not the best choice for myself. But, no matter how long it takes me I'll do what I want to do and get this car back on the road. So.. Today I spent a lot (to me) money...

Attachment 616996

I've also finally started cleaning my parts in preparation for porting and rebuilding. Got my housing all cleaned up, and tomorrow I'll take the housings and rotors to work to put them through the parts washer. I'll post pics of my cleaned parts tomorrow. One step closer!

Took me about 5 hours to get these parts as clean as they are, still a little more cleaning I'd like to do before I start porting. One step at a time!

Attachment 616935

Another quick update, getting more parts in and buying more parts. While I wait for Photobucket to upload the new pictures, I'm happy to inform that this weekend if all goes as I plan. I'll finally get to start porting my plates and housings. I'll be starting on the plates first because they will take the longest, and because I still need to knock the diffusers out of the exhaust ports on the housings. Waiting to hit up a friend at his shop to help knock those out for me. So yeah, if I keep on trudging along I should have at least a complete keg before too long!

First up I got in front camber kit plates, these should be a nice addition to my Megan coilovers to dial the front end in:
Attachment 616706

Also got in my RB fuel injector plug kit:
Attachment 616707

And this morning was pretty stoked to see my Atkins master rebuild kit showed up with some special tools :)

Attachment 616708

And just a few minutes ago, I decided to drop a little money on a Gilmer belt drive kit:
Attachment 616709

I really should have everything I need to start getting the keg back together. Bought some new carbide bits for my dremel, and just waiting for the weekend!

Please post some impressions of that specific gilmer kit when you get it. I'm debating on getting the same one. I've read a few horror stories with the rotary-works offering.

Will do, I looked at all different sets of the gilmer kits and settled on this particular kit. One I know the Aussies love their rotaries, so I can only assume they put out a good product. Plus their advertising of the product got my attention, especially with how they market it specifically for S4's. Now if there is a different between SA, S4/S5 I don't know, probably not... But we'll see.

Been a while since I've last done an update, but with warm weather returning to the Mid-West it's time to do work. So I had really planned on getting the car up and running for this summer, but some friends of mine kind of forced my hand on doing a few extra things and doing it right. Which means more money, more time, and more effort... It's kind of hard to remember the order of which everything happened so I'll do my best.

The original plan was to just clean up the engine bay, and rattle can it the factory Royal Maroon Metallic. But a buddy of mine who does body and paint for a living talked me into stripping everything down and actually professionally painting the bay in my garage. It turned out amazing, I'm so glad I did this. But this now forces my hand and this summer (hopefully June) we'll be painting the whole damn car now... Anyways, that is later and here is the process we went through on the bay.

Attachment 612962
Attachment 612963
Attachment 612964
Attachment 612965
Attachment 612966
Attachment 612967

Also I decided since on of the most, if not the most important component of a rotary powered car was cooling. I ditched the generic factory replacement beat up radiator and bought a 48mm full aluminum Koyorad with Racing Beat radiator hose kit. I'm still looking for a decent aluminum shroud with good e-fan to match up with it though.

Attachment 612968
Attachment 612969

Also since we dropped the steering rack from the engine bay to paint the subframe I took the opportunity to install my adjustable camber plates on my Megan Racing EZ Street 15-way adjustable coilovers.

Attachment 612970

Also, I jumped on the local DMV webpage for the great state of Missouri and did some research to see what custom plate combinations have been taken for rotary/rx7 related themes. To my surprise I was able to snag "WANKEL" as an option and jumped on it.

Attachment 612971

And last but certainly not least, last night I decided to bite the bullet and build my first rotary engine by myself. I was really hoping to recruit a seasoned rotary builder, but he proved to be too busy to assist me, so I followed AaronCakes's videos on building and was able to do it all myself. Side note, while the center plate really should be installed with two people, I was able to figure it out on my own. And I really fucking hate hylomar, that shit is nasty... I was able to get to the point in the second picture at 1AM this morning. I'll finish the keg up later today after I get off work.

Attachment 612972
Attachment 612973


So there you have it... Pretty much all caught up now, sorry I've slacked off on my updating. But there are such nice builds happening right now that cast a pretty big shadow on my build so didn't think it really mattered all that much. Until next time, stay tuned!

And one more little update for you all:

Attachment 612953

The motor is a nice piece there brotha .

Thank you very much, I just hope I can get it to run as good as it looks!

So quick update, engine is done all that is left is flywheel, clutch, and attach the trans. I hope to be doing that pretty soon, but still need to order the new flywheel and clutch from RB. Anyways, pics.

Attachment 612362

Attachment 612363

Attachment 612364

Attachment 612365

Attachment 612366

Man I wonder if that glimmer kit will fit with my Taurus alt ?

Hard to say! The gilmer kit I have the hole for the alt was perfect, with a lock washer and the nut it's about as snug as it's going to get. If you're feeling froggy I'd say spend money on the cheaper kit, and if need be drill out the hole a bit more and see if you can get it to fit.